by Sarah Morgan
A week later, exhausted after days of filming with Rafaele and sleepless nights in Luca’s bedroom, Taylor slid a pair of dark glasses onto her nose, took a deep breath and left her trailer. Blinded by a storm of camera flashes she struggled to keep the smile in place and it came as a relief to see the red blaze of Luca’s Ferrari. He was leaning against the bonnet, talking into his phone.
‘No, I haven’t heard from my brother. No, I don’t have any comment on his behaviour,’ he drawled, grabbing Taylor’s hand and hauling her against him. ‘I’m the last person to comment on anyone’s behaviour… . I don’t have a comment on my own either because frankly it’s none of your business.’ He hung up and pulled her into him. ‘Cristo, you’re sexy. How was your day?’
‘Exhausting. I filmed the scene where my husband appears from the dead and discovers I’m carrying his best friend’s baby.’ And she’d worked harder than she’d ever worked in order to make sure no criticism could be levelled at her but still the director had managed to make her feel inferior with his constant sniping. He’d made her redo each scene repeatedly even though she knew it had been perfect the first time. He’d wanted her to lose her temper and she’d been determined to hang on to control even if it killed her.
‘What you need is to chill or, better still, get hot and naked with someone and that someone is me.’
She found herself looking into sultry, sexy eyes fringed with impossibly thick, dark lashes and wishing she could do just that. And then she found herself wishing she could turn off her senses because she didn’t want to feel this way.
Spending so much time in his company was creating a level of tension she hadn’t thought possible. He was supposed to be a solution to a problem, instead of which he was becoming the problem.
Her instinctive response was to pull back but she was expected to play her part so when he flattened his hand against her back and drew her against him, she lifted her mouth to his. She’d intended it to be a brief kiss but his hands came up to her face and he kissed her slowly and hungrily. And because he was so good at this, because he somehow knew everything there was to know about exactly the right way to kiss her, she didn’t even try to fight it.
Seduced by the heat of his mouth and the skill of his kiss, Taylor felt will power drain from her like rain water down the gutter. If it had been up to her she never would have stopped. Who would choose to end something so perfect? And in the end he was the one who slowly lifted his head and broke the connection.
Dizzy with it, Taylor looked up at him, expecting to see mockery, but he wasn’t laughing.
And she wasn’t laughing either.
‘Let’s get out of here.’ It was the most serious she’d ever heard him and suddenly she was relieved she’d thought about this earlier before he’d fused her brain with the skill of his mouth.
‘I’ve already planned tonight. I have a surprise for you—tickets for the opera in Palermo.’ The idea had come to her halfway through the day when she’d been desperate to do something that allowed them to be ‘seen’ together, but still gave her privacy from the public. What better place than a dark box high above the auditorium? And it had the added benefit that she’d be saved from intimate conversation.
She had no idea if he even liked opera and no opportunity to ask him with the journalists surrounding them. One of them pushed against her in an attempt to elbow the competition out of the way and Taylor would have stumbled but a strong arm came round her waist. Holding her safe in the protective circle of his arm, Luca snapped something in Italian that Taylor didn’t understand. Whatever it was that he said turned the man several shades paler and he backed away, giving them space, hands raised in a gesture of apology.
‘Get in the car, dolcezza.’ Luca was calm and in control. ‘I’ll get you out of here.’
Grateful to him, Taylor slid into the Ferrari thinking how much easier it was to handle the press when he was with her. He wore the Corretti power as lightly and elegantly as his immaculate suits but there was strength and steel under the casual sophistication and she knew the press found him intimidating. They treated him with a degree of caution they never afforded to her.
‘Thank you.’
He didn’t have to ask what she was thanking him for. ‘I’m starting to understand why you’re so scared of the press. They never leave you alone.’ He was frowning as he weaved through the heavy Palermo traffic. ‘Has it always been like that?’
‘Yes. Right from the beginning. I had a mother who knew how to give them exactly what they wanted. She was the master at drawing media attention and using it.’
‘Just what you want when you’re an awkward adolescent.’
‘It’s got worse since then. I’ve come to accept I’ll never shake them off. My dream is to go out and for no one to recognise me. Once, just once, I’d love to live life like a normal person, not having to worry about who is pointing a camera and how what I do will be interpreted. Can you imagine that?’ She gave a short, desperate laugh because she knew it was never going to happen.
‘What would you do? If you could go out and not be recognised—what would you do?’
‘I don’t know. Just go to a concert or something and stand in the crowd. Blend in. But seeing as that isn’t going to happen, I choose to do things that give me some privacy. Do you even like opera? It seemed like a good idea but now I’m not sure.’
‘I’m Sicilian. I love opera.’
She relaxed slightly. Even the most persistent observer was unlikely to interrupt the opera to ask them questions about their relationship, and the bonus was that they wouldn’t be able to talk. He wouldn’t be able to make some sharp comment that showed how easily he saw through to the person she really was.
He already knew far too much about her.
An evening at the opera should be perfect.
Except that it didn’t turn out that way.
She’d thought that the dark would protect them from prying eyes, but it turned out she was wrong about that too.
Seated close together in the privacy of a box, his leg brushed against hers and she immediately ceased to focus on anything that was happening on the stage. She was aware of heads turning towards them in the darkness and felt a brief flicker of frustration that even here, in the protected atmosphere of the opera theatre, they couldn’t escape the scrutiny of the public.
But that irritation gave way to deeper, darker concerns. Like the fact that although their engagement might be fake there was nothing fake about the sexual tension simmering between them. It was raw, hot and real and becoming harder to ignore with each burning look they exchanged. And the intensity of the feeling confused her. He was insanely handsome, of course, but she’d met enough handsome men during the course of her career to be immune to the combination of perfectly proportioned features and a powerful physique. No, the connection came from something deeper. Something she saw beneath the surface layers of eye-catching masculinity. And whatever it was that drew her, drew her now as they sat close together, thigh pressed against thigh in the dark intimacy of the opera house.
As drama unfolded on the stage beneath them, so drama unfolded in the box.
She was aware of every beat of her heart. Aware of him and when Luca’s hand covered hers she knew she ought to pull hers way but she didn’t. Couldn’t. So instead of ending it there she laced Her fingers with his and he drew her hand onto his thigh. It was a subtle, sensual dance between man and woman. Her gaze was fixed on the stage but she saw nothing, heard nothing, felt nothing except the strength of his fingers on hers and the hard muscle of his thigh under her palm. Heat traced her skin, desire knotted low in her pelvis and she opened her eyes because closing them left the world to her imagination and that was a dangerous place to be right now.
She’d promised herself no more relationships. She’d trained herself to ignore that wild, passionate part of herself that had got her into trouble in the past. She’d decided there would be no more unguarded moments where she trusted a ma
n only to wake up the next morning and discover the personal had become public.
But this—this was more temptation than she knew how to deal with.
She’d chosen to wear a floor-length dress but that proved to be no barrier because somehow his hand was on her bare thigh, his long skilled fingers tantalisingly close to that part of her. She clamped her thighs together but the movement didn’t dislodge his hand and she felt his fingers stroke inside her panties and her face burned in the darkness because she knew he’d find her already aroused. She turned her head and was scorched by the dark heat in his eyes. Her breathing was shallow and so was his and he held her gaze as his fingers slid deeper, exploring her with erotic precision and unapologetic intimacy until not moving took all her willpower. But she couldn’t move or make a sound because that would have risked drawing the attention of the audience away from the performance onstage and so she was forced to stay totally still and silent. And he took ruthless advantage, relentless in his delivery of pleasure as he explored the slick heat of her, creating sensation so wickedly good she was forced to clamp her jaws closed to hold back the sound.
She wanted him to stop. She didn’t want him to stop. She didn’t know what she wanted but he knew and he took her there, with nothing but his fingers and the intensity of his hot, dark gaze that held hers all the way through the pulsing shock waves of her climax.
On stage the soprano was singing her way to the grave but here, in the shaded darkness of the box, it was all about life and passion.
Shattered and trembling, Taylor stared at him. He leaned in, bringing his mouth close to hers. His kiss was slow, lingering, deliberate. Personal. Less of an assault and more a promise and she realised there was no way this was over. His hand was still between her legs. Her hand was in his lap and he was painfully aroused, rock hard under her warm palm.
Time passed. She had no idea how much time until applause washed around her. For a terrible moment she thought they were clapping for her and then realised that the singing had stopped. The opera had finished. And she was expected to stand up and act as if nothing had happened.
It was Luca who gently eased away from her and smoothed her dress before the lights came up and she was grateful for the dress because it concealed how much her legs were shaking. She wasn’t sure she was capable of walking, but he took her arm calmly and somehow she managed to walk out of the box, through the crowd, as if the passion had all been on the stage and not between the two of them.
There were stares, of course, but she was used to that.
What she wasn’t used to was feeling so out of control.
Taylor kept her head down as they walked, ignoring the demands of the press to know when they were getting married, afraid to look at him because she had no idea what was in her eyes.
Flashbulbs blinded her as Luca accelerated away in the Ferrari and she was so relieved by the burst of speed that left everyone else far behind she didn’t even snipe at him.
She didn’t speak.
He didn’t speak.
But the tension throbbed between them like a living force, thickening the air until it was almost impossible to breathe, the atmosphere sexually charged and the heat almost unbearable.
Their restraint lasted until they closed the bedroom door and then they both moved. Together. At the same time, mouths fused, hands desperate, tearing at fabric, sliding over skin, greedy for each other and determined to feed the hunger.
His jacket hit the floor.
Her dress slithered after it.
Her hands ripped at his shirt, exposing wide shoulders and hard male muscle, and she felt that muscle flex as he lifted her easily and flattened her against the wall. her eyes closed. His mouth was hot on her neck and on the exposed curve of her breasts. He dragged down the lace of her bra and fastened his mouth over her nipple, the skilled flick of his tongue dragging a gasp from her. It was a relief to be able to let the sound escape.
She wound her leg around his hips and felt him shift slightly as he loosened his belt. Desperate, he fumbled for something and then his trousers hit the floor with the rest of their clothes and she felt the silken hardness of him against her thigh.
‘Ti voglio tanto—I want you.’ Switching between languages, Luca stumbled over the words, his hand behind her neck as he brought his mouth down on hers and captured her lips in a raw, explicit kiss that sent shock waves of sensation rocketing through her body.
‘Me too—me too…’ She was barely coherent as she closed her hand round the thick length of him, heard him groan and say something in Italian she didn’t understand and then his hands were under her bottom and he was lifting her, supporting her weight with his arms as he pressed her back against the wall and entered her with a single hard thrust that joined them completely. The feel of him deep inside her was so shockingly good she cried out. No silence for her this time as the hot, hard heat of him consumed her and no silence from him either as he released a raw, primitive groan that originated somewhere deep in his throat.
She was already so wet from the erotic torment of their silent foreplay at the opera her body welcomed his, clamping round the silken strength of him, testing his control. She knew a brief moment of relief that he’d used a condom and then sanity left her and there was only the madness they created together.
‘Cristo—’ His voice unsteady, he thrust deeper even though deeper didn’t seem possible because he was already part of her and they moved together, fast, hard, desperate as they let the feelings burn through them. Neither of them tried to stop it. Neither of them pretended this wasn’t what they wanted, because both knew it was. It was what they’d wanted from that first moment in the maze. It was wild, but they didn’t care. It was crazy, but they didn’t care about that either. They cared about nothing except the moment and when the moment came, when he drove her to another climax, she pulled him over with her, her body tightening around his, sharing each pulse, each thrust, each explosion of sensation as they tumbled together over the edge and into ecstasy.
CHAPTER SEVEN
LUCA WOKE IN a panic.
The reason came back to him before he opened his eyes.
He’d spent the night with a woman.
The whole night.
In his bed. In his home, where he never brought anyone.
Admittedly, more than half the night had been spent having sex. Wild, abandoned, selfishly indulgent sex. After the first time when they’d barely made it through the door they’d graduated to the rug on the floor, his luxurious shower and finally the bed where each had exhausted the other until they’d fallen asleep wrapped around each other.
Wrapped around each other…
Drenched in panic, he was about to spring from the bed when he realised it was empty and that Taylor was stumbling round the room, snatching up her clothes like a woman running for her life.
Distracted by the urgency in her movements, Luca forgot his own panic and absorbed hers. ‘Is Etna erupting and we have just minutes to escape? Should I call the emergency services?’
‘Go back to sleep.’ Dragging open a drawer, she locked her hand around the first item of clothing she encountered. Dressed only in her panties with her trademark hair clouded and tangled from a night of wild sex, she was still the hottest woman he’d ever seen.
Realising that for the first time in his life he was witnessing a woman who was even more panicked about relationships than he was, Luca relaxed slightly.
She pulled on the T-shirt without bothering with a bra, a decision Luca supported wholeheartedly.
‘This is like a strip in reverse but it’s surprisingly erotic.’ His own panic fading, he hooked his hands behind his head and watched as she yanked on jeans in such haste she almost fell. ‘Where exactly are you going in this much of a hurry? This is Sicily. No one rushes in Sicily. You’re not on New York time now, dolcezza.’ But he knew her frantic rush to get dressed and escape had nothing to do with a desire to get to work and everything to do with her need to escape fr
om a situation that terrified her. It would have terrified him too, except that she was panicking enough for both of them.
‘I’m going out—’ she snapped the words and zipped her jeans so violently he flinched ‘—out…somewhere. Anywhere.’
She dressed with no thought and yet she looked effortlessly stunning. It occurred to him that women would break down and cry if they knew how little effort Taylor Carmichael put into looking as good as she did. She was thought of as an actress but she could just as easily have modelled, especially now with her expression as moody as Etna on a bad day and her hair pouring over her shoulders in wild disarray.
There was something oddly vulnerable about her panic and, because he understood it, he took pity on her. ‘There’s no need to run. I’m not about to declare undying love and try and put a gold band on your finger. You’re probably safer with me than any other man alive.’
‘This isn’t about you.’ She bent down to retrieve her shoes, the movement so fluid and graceful he immediately wanted to haul her back to bed.
‘So why are you running?’
She came upright and scooped her hair away from her face, her eyes fierce. ‘Because I don’t do this. I—I just can’t.’
‘Do what? Stay and eat breakfast? Because that’s all that’s on offer.’
‘I don’t eat breakfast.’ Her foot shot out and she kicked at the pile of clothes they’d torn off each other the night before, searching for something. ‘And I can’t do this whole morning-after touchy-feely crap. It’s not me. Damn—have you seen my watch? I was wearing it last night.’
‘It lacerated my back at one stage so now it’s by the bed. And I don’t do touchy-feely either.’ His words didn’t appear to penetrate because she glared at him as she strode across the room and snatched up her watch.
‘Do you know how many years I’ve stopped myself doing this?’
‘Quite a few if your wild response last night was anything to go by. Next time you might want to shorten your periods of abstinence. Your she-wolf act could kill a regular guy. I think I have teeth marks in my shoulder.’